Our Nation's Peril 



Social Ideals and Social Progress 



BY 



LEWIS G. JANES 



Director of the Cambridge Conferences; former President of the Brooklyn 

Ethical Association; late Lecturer on Sociology and Civics in the 

School of Political Science, Brooklyn, N.Y. ; Author of 

" Evolution of Morals," " Life as a Fine Art," 

" Cosmic Evolution as Related to 

Ethics," etc., etc. 



BOSTON 
JAMES H. WEST CO., PUBLISHERS 
79 Milk Street 
1899 






WVs jcx^vivo .qq 



Our Nation's Peril 



Social Ideals and Social Progress 



BY 



/ 
LEWIS G. JANES 



Director of the Cambridge Conferences; former President of the Brooklyn 

Ethical Association; late Lecturer on Sociology and Civics in the 

School of Political Science, Brooklyn, N.Y. ; Author of 

" Evolution of Morals," " Life as a Fine Art," 

" Cosmic Evolution as Related to 

Ethics," etc., etc. 



BOSTON 
JAMES H. WEST CO., PUBLISHERS 

79 Milk Street 
1899 



\ 



1E.113 



«" m 



Thk American Ideal. 



'^The Fathers tvho created the Republic . . . grasped not only 
the whole race of man then living, hut they reached fortvard and 
seized upon the farthest posterity. They erected a beacon to 
guide their children and their children's children and the count- 
less myriads tvho should inhabit the earth in other ages. Wise 
statesmen as they were, they kneiv the tendency of prosperity to 
breed tyrants, and so they established these great self-evident 
truths, that when in the distant future some man, some faction, 
some interest, should set up the doctrine that none but rich men, 
or none hut white m,en, or none but Anglo-Saxon white men were 
entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, their 
posterity might look up again to the Declaration of Independence 
and take courage to renew the battle tchich their fathers began, 
so that truth and justice a?id mercy and all the humane and 
Christian virtues might not he extinguished from the land : so 
that no man should thereafter dare to limit or circumscribe the 
great pjrinciples on which the temple of liberty tvas being built. 

"Nov;, my countrymen, if you have been taught doctrines 
conflicting with the Declaration of Independence ; if you have 
listened to suggestions which ivould take away from its grandeur 
and midilate the fair symmetry of its proportions, . . . let me 
entreat you to come hack. Return to the fountain -whose waters 
spring close by the blood of the Revolution.'^ — Abraham Lincoln, 
Lewiston Speech, August, 1858. 



Copyright, 1899, 
By Jamks H. West Co. 



OUR NATION'S PERIL: 

SOCIAL IDEALS AND SOCIAL PROGRESS. 



THE kinship of man to the lower animals is now a generally 
recognized deduction from the doctrine of evolution. The 
study of the genus homo, and of particular individuals 
included in the genus, noAV proceeds with due recognition 
and use of the comparative method. Not only has this method 
proved fruitful in the investigation of human anatomy and 
physiology, and in promoting a correct understanding of the 
physical attributes of man, it is also likely to be even more 
profitable in the study of his mental characteristics and his social 
impulses. We are beginning to see that man is essentially a 
social being, and that his vision of the world is largely tinged 
and modified by his past social experiences and those of his 
gregarious pre-human progenitors. 

It is not altogether in the field of analog}', however, that the 
comparative method is fruitful in anthropological and sociological 
researches. The differences between man and his poor relations 
of the lower animal types are quite as interesting and instructive 
as the likenesses. If reversion to animal traits and conduct 
throws important light on the problems of criminal anthropology 
and degeneration in human societies, it is in quite another 
direction that we must turn for our explanation of those 
progressive social and individual tendencies which have raised 
man above the l^rute creation and inspired him to transform and 
regenerate himself and his world-environment. 

Man, as far as we know, is the only animal capable of creating 
ideals — of projecting the synthetic imagination into the realm of 
futnre possibilities, and of erecting there beacon-lights which will 
guide and inspire him to higher and ever higher achievements. 



4 ouK nation's peril 

He is the only animal that, by the exercise of intelligent volition, 
can determine his own conduct and direct his own activities to 
ideal ends. The lower animal types reach stages of statical 
adaptation to the world-environment beyond which they are never 
lifted save by the influence of artificial selection, under the 
direction of human intelligence. Man is the only conscious 
creature endowed with a nature infinitely progressive in its 
capabilities ; and its chief difference from the natui-e of the lower 
animal types lies exactly in this point of its ability to formulate 
ideals and make them the object of its consecrated aspiration and 
effort. Living creatures below the human are forced up the scale 
of being mainly under the stress of physical necessities, by the 
operation of the law of natural selection, which finds its 
opportunity in the never-ceasing struggle for existence. While 
these influences are by no means relaxed in the experience of 
man, he is also led up the scale of being by the friendly hand of 
the ideals created by his synthetic imagination. 

We should by no means be justified in inferring, however, that 
man's ideals constitute infallible guides in the improvement of 
social or individual conditions. They partake of the finiteness 
and fallibility of his human nature, and are more or less helpful 
and inspiring as they spring from greater or less degrees of 
intelligence, correct information, and consecrated moral purpose. 
It is even possible for these ideals to become wholly aberrant and 
misleading, and to promote social and individual degeneration, 
instead of progress. The study of these ideals, and of the 
conditions under which they are created and become dominant 
factors in the lives of men and of societies, is therefore of the 
highest import to the student of social conditions, as well as to 
the statesman, moral reformer and religious teacher. It is to 
this study, and to some of the practical conclusions that seem to 
flow from it, that this paper would invite attention. 

As it relates to the individual life and character, the principle 
involved in our thesis is clearly recognized in the prescient 
saying : ''As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he." Everywhere 
the founder of Christianity emphasizes the inner nature and 
purpose of the heart, rather than the outward act, as the criterion 
of character. While this is none the less strongly emphasized 
by the scientific psychology and sociology of the present day, 
they also affirm the importance of studying the motive, or ideal, 
in the light of its eventuation in the act and its consequences, in 



SOCIAL IDEALS AND SOCIAL PKOGKESS 5 

order to correct the aberrations due to hiinian ignorance and 
fallibility. In our relations to our fellow-men and to society, we 
are justly held responsible, not merely for sincerity of purpose 
and the consecration of will and effort towards its attainment, 
but also for an intelligent understanding of the results which 
necessarily flow from the courses of action which we are thus 
impelled to undertake. 

It is not to the individual but to the social implications of the 
principle that I wish here especially to call attention. A brief 
reference to some of the wider and more general illustrations of 
the influence of social ideals on the trend of civilization and racial 
development may help to clear the way for a closer and more 
practical application of our thesis to the problems immediately 
before us for solution. Whatever may be our individual estimate 
of the nature of religion and the utility of religious beliefs, no 
thoughtful student of history can fail to recognize the potent 
influence of religious ideals in determining the destinies of the 
race. It is in the broader attitude of religion toward life, rather 
than in its special dogmas or ritual observances, that this 
influence is chiefly felt in moulding the character of social 
institutions. 

The Oriental religions are generally pessimistic in their 
attitude toward the life that now is. Tacitly or implicitly, they 
assume that suffering and evil are such dominant and all-pervading 
factors in the very nature of a phenomenal existence that the only 
rational ideal for human aspiration is the attainment of a state 
which transcends the phenomenal, and in which supreme bliss is 
reached by the renunciation of all which niakes life in this 
phenomenal world. This life, the orthodox Hindu says, is 
Maya — real enough indeed as a fact of present experience, full 
of ignorance with its resulting pains and sorrows, but owing its 
reality in our consciousness to the fact that somehow the soul has 
become entangled in the mesh of material things, and is thereby 
blinded to its true nature. This veil of illusion can only be torn 
away by the attainment of a super-conscious state in which all 
sense of "I " and "Thou," of a subjective world of mind and an 
objective world of matter, alike transitory and phenomenal, is 
utterly transcended. Brahminism, therefore, largely gives itself 
up to meditation and introspection, pays little heed to the 
improvement of material conditions, neglects or mortifies the flesh 
by ascetic observances, regards the celibate life as more holy than 



6 OUR XATION S PERIL 

that of wedlock, pays so little attention to statesmanship and the 
science of government that its social organism never rises out of 
the feudal condition until it has fallen a prey to one foreign 
invader after another, finally achieving its nearest approach to 
political unity and a common feeling of nationality under English 
rule. The development of the Caste system in India is the result 
of an attempt to avoid the stress of competition by the rigid 
segregation of industries and occupations, rather than by seeking 
a higher solution of the industrial problem through rational 
thought, persistent effort, and a normal process of unhampered 
evolution. 

Buddhism was in some respects a natural reaction against the 
inertia and extreme bent toward introspection and metaphysical 
speculation illustrated in Brahminism, but it also is profoundly 
pessimistic as regards the present life. It views this earthly 
existence as a transitory process, full of pain and misery. It 
denies a permanent soul entity, and is silent as to the 
existence of a permanent Being behind the never-ceasing round 
of phenomenal change. Its Nirvana, whether or not it implies 
absolute non-existence, is an escape from the consciousness of 
temporal conditions and the succession of re-incarnations, into a 
state so wholly different as to be indescribable in language, and 
only to be apprehended through experience. Buddhism, trans- 
planted from its native soil, has doubtless largely misunderstood 
and misinterpreted the thought of its founder. Though on the 
whole it has given an ethical uplift to the nations where it has 
taken root, it has often been overgrown with superstitions, and 
has not been able to throw off the incubus of pessimism which 
was its inheritance. 

Zoroastrianism and Judaism, in their earlier developed forms, 
though scarcely less pessimistic as regards the present conditions 
of earthly existence, are less mystical and metaphysical, and more 
objective in their visions of the future life. Both dream, as did 
the early Christian, of a regenerated earth, purified b}' fire, and 
inhabited by a race purged of sin and endowed with immortality. 
Here we have no vision of a state superconscious and indescribable, 
but of a world of conscious existence in a redeemed society, as a 
boon to the righteous. The greater objectivity of this ideal, and 
the hope for ultimate happiness on a regenerated earth, has doubt- 
less been a large factor in maintaining the wonderful vitality of 
the Jew in spite of expatriation and persecution, and in preserving 



SOCIAL IDEALS AXD SOCIAL PROGRESS 7 

the qualities of enterprise and commercial success both in the 
Jew and in the Tarsi. 

In the more invigorating atmosphere of Occidental life, the 
conception of the present state of existence has never been 
wholly pessimistic. The Greek and Roman rejoiced in bodily 
strength and beauty, and found enjoyment in conflict with the foe 
and the contest with the forces and inertia of the physical world. 
Even their barbaric games, the fierce contests of the arena, 
testify to a delight in life and in the exercise of the bodily 
powers which we do not find in the developed thought of the 
Orient. Plato, who voiced the highest thought of the Greek, 
described in his " Republic " his conception of an ideal earthly 
society. Aristotle also draws his picture of the perfect social 
state. Though neither Plato nor Aristotle dreamed of lifting 
the slave into citizenship, or of assuring to all an equality of 
social or industrial opportunity, the visions of both were hopeful 
of future possibilities in an earthly society, and were incentives 
to effort toward their realization. Both the Greek and the 
Roman, however, laid stress on custom, legislation and govern- 
mental authority as the means of social regeneration, rather than 
upon education and the transformation of individual character ; 
and the political structures of both were ultimately wrecked on 
the rocks of imperialism and the supremacy of military power. 

Christianity, mingling its primitive ethical and eschatological 
conceptions with the prevalent Pagan ideas, has at once held up 
the vision of an objective heaven, wherein the associations and 
some of the activities of the earthly life will be continued, and 
enforced the obligation of transforming human society, so as to 
build up the Kingdom of God on the earth. Adapting itself to 
varying racial and political conditions as none of the older 
religions were able to do, it has nowhere left a pure and 
unadulterated bequest of institutions inspired by the ideals of 
its founder. Its influence can only be traced as modified by 
local environments, and more or less distorted by varying racial 
and philosophical tendencies. The dominant ideals in the 
modern Christian and civilized world are rather national and 
local than ethical and universal. The love of individual liberty 
which characterizes the Teutonic peoples, conjoined to racial self- 
confidence, industrial and commercial enterprise seeking world- 
conquest for its opportunities, mingled with a poorly concealed 
contempt for weaker races, is modified by the local circumstances 



8 OUR nation's peril 

under which it finds expression. In England and Holland the 
dominant ideals are those of commercial and industrial supremacy. 
In Germany, whether under the scholastic influence of the 
Hegelian philosophy, as Mr. Davidson surmises,^ or not, the 
conception of a strong government under an imperial director has 
given the tendency of social evolution a somewhat different trend. 
In the United States the democratic spirit, so long our dominant 
ideal, is now struggling for supremacy with the commercial and 
money-making power which dominates the policy of the Mother 
Country. 

In the light of historical investigation, it is not difficult to 
foresee the outcome of some of these tendencies in national life. 
Unrestrained by those religious influences which still constitute 
a distinct factor in the policy of the Latin peoples, the imperial- 
ism of Germany is drifting rapidly toward a form of State 
Socialism. Whether or not this tendency shall ultimately take a 
democratic rather than an autocratic trend, it will in either case 
rigidly constrain and inhibit individual freedom. The industrial 
conditions tending to this result are world-wide, and in so far as 
the Latin nations become emancipated from the restraining 
influence of the Eoman Church, we may anticipate a similar 
though somewhat more tardy development of the socialistic 
policy in them. Though England and the United States, more 
than any other nations, have felt the movement of the democratic 
spirit, it is not doubtful that influences are now strongly at work 
in these countries, which threaten to impel them in the same 
direction. The concentration of wealth in the hands of a few 
great exploiters of industrial enterprise gives them a power in 
legislation and the direction of public policies which enables 
them to control the machinery of government, and practically to 
annul the influence of the masses of the people; while the 
demands of commercial greed, seeking for extended markets, 
encourage the spirit of conquest and military domination, thus 
creating the machinery which the advocates of State Socialism 
have only to seize and use. That the masters of commerce and 
manufacture, the promoters of combinations and trusts, the 
millionaires who seek the Senatorial toga and positions of power 
and responsibility in the State, are blind to the certain outcome 
of these tendencies does not render them less clear to the student 
of sociological conditions. 

1 " The Task of the Twentieth Century," a lecture by Thomas Davidson. 



SOCIAL IDKALS AXD SOCIAL PUOGKESS 9 

^ The situation may be summed uj) in the statement that the 
ideals now dominant in our western workl are economic and 
materialistic rather than ethical and idealistic; that under the 
influence of such ideals a scarcely veiled egoism dominates even 
our avowed altruistic impulses, and threatens to transform 
democracy itself into an instrument for undermining personal 
liberty, destroying individual opportunity, and sowing everywhere 
the seeds of disintegration and decay in the heart of our boasted 
civilization. If it is said that these are no new influences, that 
they are illustrative of the same old forces and tendencies that 
have existed in human societies since the world began, the fact 
certainly must be admitted. Like self-willed children, the great 
nations of the present day seem bound to attain wisdom, if indeed 
they ever do attain it, through the hard school of personal 
experience, rather than by a thoughtful appreciation of the 
lessons taught by the experience of past generations. But with 
the machinery of modern civilization, it is at once the hope and 
the serious concern of the thoughtful student of social conditions 
that progress toward the inevitable result must be vastly more 
rapid than it has ever been before in the world's history. Will 
it be sufficiently rapid to arrest the attention of the wisest and 
most thoughtful leaders and teachers of the people, through them 
to create nobler ideals in our social, national and industrial life, 
and so assure a reversal of these tendencies toward social 
degeneracy ? 

Since the advent of Christianity, there have been in many ages 
great thinkers and large-hearted lovers of their kind, from Saint 
Augustine to Sir Thomas More, Edward Bellamy and William 
Dean Howells, who have formulated their visions of a perfect life 
and endeavored to popularize ideals in harmony with that religion 
to which Christendom gives a formal lip-service. These ideals 
have been of real utility in revealing the defects in the existing 
social order, and in stimulating efforts for its betterment. They 
have failed to become potent in determining the actual trend of 
social evolution because they have built upon speculative and 
metaphysical conceptions of the nature of man as a social being, 
rather than upon a scientitic understanding of the conditions with 
which they have attempted to deal. It is only within very recent 
times, indeed, that anything like a scientific study of man and 
society has been attempted, and the results of this study even 
now have hardly permeated the most intelligent stratum of 



10 OUR nation's peril 

modern society. Sociology is just beginning to take its place as^ 
a university study, and its method is often far from scientific. 
The discussion of a pi'iori theories and speculations often largely 
supplants serious efforts to investigate and comprehend the life 
of man as revealed in existing societies and as related to his 
historical past. Yet the wisest students of society are convinced 
that the method which has been so fruitful of beneficent results 
on the material plane of life may be made no less fruitful in its 
application to social and economic problems. 

Hitherto men have spun their social theories, very much as 
they have their theological and philosophical notions, out of their 
inner consciousness, and have looked for the fulfilment of their 
social ideals by revolutionary methods. Revolution, indeed, 
often comes as a result of this unscientific method of procedure, 
but the ideals of the Revolutionists are never fully achieved. 
The communistic agitator of the present day is often an idealist, 
filled with the noblest altruistic impulses ; but he would trans- 
form society by a violent disregard of the most fundamental 
qualities of human nature, knocking away the very ladder by 
which man has climbed out of barbarism and animalism and 
disregarding the principle of social justice which apportions 
rewards according to deserts, in the vain attempt to establish an 
impossible and undesirable ideal of social equality. He would 
make man's desires, or his assumed physical and intellectual 
necessities, the measure of his right to the use of the earth and 
the products of industry, rather than the quality and faithfulness 
of his own service ; thereby perpetuating the conditions of infancy 
in the adult life of the world, and creating societies of grown-up 
babes rather than of manly and self-reliant men and women. 
The social ideal of the communist, which aims primarily at 
equality, if it became dominant, would produce a dead-level of 
mediocrity in character and attainment, a statical condition in 
society which would inhibit progress and lead inevitably to 
retrogression. The production of variations is the essential 
condition of all evolution — the necessary joozi sto for the operation 
of natural selection, volitional effort, or any other imaginable 
evolutionary agency ; and this would be seriously retarded by a 
communistic or socialistic regime. However exalted may be the 
aims of the advocates of the communistic propaganda and the 
abolition of private property, the scientific sociologist must 
regard the ideals which they hold up for the admiration and 



SOCIAL IDEALS AND SOCIAL PROGRESS 



11 



aspiration of the toiling poor as distinctly reactionary and 
mischievous. 

The scientific student of society begins by ascertaining the 
facts of human evolution and observing the natural trend of 
social progress. He recognizes the divine law of evolution in 
every step of the way, even in the struggle for existence which 
marks its earlier stages and is nowhere entirely absent. Instead 
of endeavoring to stem the tide of social evolution, which has 
been steadily away from a homogeneous society in which all 
perform like functions and occupy relatively identical positions, 
toward a society more and more heterogeneous in its structure, 
wherein individuals perform functions more and more individual- 
ized and unlike, he endeavors to educate the will and intelligence 
to conform to this natural order and tendency, thereby avoiding 
the friction, suffering and pain which always accompany resistance 
to Nature's processes. He perceives that perfect social integration 
can be achieved neither by anarchical independence nor by 
the communistic dependence of the individual on society; but 
rather by the mutual interdependence of completely individual- 
ized social units, each of whom renders to society the highest 
possible service, receiving therefor a reward proportionate to 
the faithfulness, skill and intelligence which are combined in 
his work. 

Social Science, like all other sciences, does not rest with the 
mere collection, verification and collation of facts derived from 
the study of man in his relations with his fellows ; it searches 
beneath these facts for the general principles which underlie and 
account for them. These principles, when scientifically discovered 
and verified, ai-e regarded as laws of evolution, and deductive 
inferences logically drawn from them are strictly justifiable 
according to the scientific method. The discovery of such laws 
has always been regarded as the crowning achievement of science 
in other fields of research. That similar laws are revealed by the 
scientific investigation of social phenomena is the claim of the 
evolutionary sociologist. Having clearly recognized these general 
principles underlying all actual progressive tendencies in society, 
the deduction from them of rational rules of conduct is the only 
reasonable and genuinely scientific mode of procedure. By this 
method only can correct ideals be formulated, and human volition 
be trained to co-operate with Nature in a normal process of 
evolution, instead of working blindly, by empirical experimentation. 



12 OUR nation's peril 

and thus producing abnormal conditions, to escape from which 
violent and revolutionary methods are often necessary. 

The outcome of all these normal processes which tend toward 
the goal of perfection, whether in the lower phases of cosmic and 
biological evolution, or in the development of man and society, is 
fulness of life — the free and unhampered exercise of every 
natural faculty under conditions of opportunity most favorable to 
this end. Natural selection operates only to preserve such 
variations as directly serve this purpose. The destruction and 
atrophy of organs and functions in the individual organism, of 
individuals and species in the biological world, or of nations and 
societies in the higher arena of man's social relationships, result 
always from a negative, never from the positive, operation of this 
law — from the simple withdrawal of natural selection rather than 
from its direct destructive activity. The "unfit" must needs 
suffer by reason of their want of adaptation to environing 
conditions, and are therefore mercifully eliminated when the 
conflict becomes actually hopeless. Nature thus always seems to 
be working by the most effectual methods toward a beneficent 
end. When, however, false political and social ideals induce us 
to force upon undeveloped races or individuals a struggle for 
which they are not prepared by the slow processes of normal 
evolution, the inevitable result is the destruction of such races 
and individuals, not their elevation into a fuller and larger life. 
Our artificial attempts to civilize and Christianize the lower races 
are often tragical failures instead of successes, from the lack of 
knowledge of this important natural law. Nowhere is this result 
more pathetically evident than in the Hawaiian Islands, whose 
native inhabitants have been repeatedly decimated by vices 
and diseases introduced by contact with our so-called higher 
civilization, together with oppressive and violent changes in their 
habits and conditions of life, for insistence upon which their 
oppressors will not be held guiltless in the great ethical accounting, 
from which neither individuals nor nations can escape. 

Nature always seeks her ends, by preference, through the 
processes of gradual modification and orderly growth, rather than 
by the production of violent and revolutionary changes. We 
readily recognize this fact in the ordinary range of biological 
evolution, but not so readily, perhaps, in contemplating the great 
cosmic changes that have antedated and accompanied the growth 
of living forms, or in that subsequent societary development in 



SOCIAL IDEALS AND SOCIAL PROGRESS 13 

which the human will is a co-operating factor. Cataclysms, 
indeed, are sometimes necessaiy ; but whenever they occur they 
bring about a return to something like the original chaos, and 
compel Nature to begin her evolutionary processes over again. It 
is the '•' silent perseverance " of Nature which promotes the surest 
and most rapid progress. Violent upheavals of the existing 
order involve the loss of much valuable time, which is saved by 
constant and orderly obedience to Nature's upbuilding laws. 
However strongly, therefore, our ideals may shame and rebuke 
our actual achievements, they should be approximated by 
evolutionary and not by revolutionary methods. 

In the application of the scientific method to social and 
governmental problems, the formation of correct ideals is a 
legitimate and most important step. Critics like the late 
Professor Huxley, Mr. Benjamin Kidd, and Professor W. G. 
Sumner, who assume that such ideals necessarily antagonize 
the operations of cosmic law, render a questionable service to 
sociological discussions. Professor Sumner asserts, for example, 
that social ideals are not discoverable through experience ; that 
they are creations of the speculative reason acting wholly on 
a priori data. Speaking of the doctrine of civil liberty, he 
declares that " it is not a scientific fact ; it is not in the order of 
Nature." It is a dogma " which never had an historical 
foundation." ^ The only evidence which can be adduced in 
behalf of his assertion is to be found in the admitted fact that 
social ideals have nowhere yet l)een completely realized in the 
historical development of society ; and this, I suppose, is what 
the learned Professor really meant to assert. Is it a correct 
inference from this fact that such ideals, and the doctrine of civil 
liberty in particular, '^ have no historical foundation " ? To the 
student of the scientific method, it would certainly appear 
otherwise. 

The chief glory of natural science is that synthetizing and 
prophetic quality which enables its disciples, by the investigation 
of past tendencies and existing facts, to discover the normal 
trend and direction of Nature's processes, to formulate the 
general principles or laws of growth, and thereby to reach 
forward to new discoveries. In this manner science has proceeded 
in its progressive conquest of the laws and forces of the material 
world. '' The scientific use of the imagination " has been 

* Popular Science Monthly. 



14 OUR nation's peril 

recognized even by Professor Huxley as a most important factor 
in scientific procedure.^ This is by no means mere a priori 
guess-work; it is the projection of the trained reason, acting 
upon a synthesis of materials derived from the investigation of 
observed facts and discovered laws and forces, into the region of 
the unknown. Watt, noticing the action of steam escaping from 
a kettle, and therefrom deducing inferences that led to the 
invention of the steam-engine; Newton, regarding the falling 
apple, and therefrom receiving the suggestion that led to the 
discovery of the law of gravitation; Adams and LeVerrier, 
independently noting the perturbations of Uranus, reasoning 
that the cause must be found in the existence of an unseen 
planet, computing its position in space and finding it there 
with their telescopes; Agassiz, reconstructing an animal of 
an extinct species by the study of a single bone : — these are all 
examples of the prophetic and deductive method in scientific 
research which supplements the inductive empiricism of an 
earlier stage of scientific progress, and lies at the foundation of 
all notable advancement in our knowledge of Nature and 
comprehension of her stable and everlasting laws. Social ideals 
and the laws of societary development may be formulated and 
discovered by precisely analogous methods. While, in the past, 
efforts in this direction have doubtless been largely speculative 
and metaphysical, it is the hope and promise of better things in 
the future that they may become strictly scientific. 

In order that this may be accomplished, the student of 
sociological phenomena must be thoroughly grounded in the 
scientific method as it is revealed in the study of the physical 
and biological sciences. He must carry the results of these 
investigations, as well as their method, into the higher realms of 
psychology and sociology. By the great masters of evolutionary 
science, society is regarded as an organism, possessing functions 
and attributes corresponding to those of the individual organism. 
Mr. Spencer notes, however, that society differs from the higher 
individual organisms in the fact that no social sensorium is 
discoverable. It is the sensorium, which feels and thinks and 
wills, that constitutes the ultimate goal of all evolutionary 
processes — the criterion of judgment as to their nature and 
trend. In organic structures, therefore, the unit or cell exists 
for the sake of the completed organism, while in society the 

' See Essay in " Lay Sermons." 



SOCIAL IDEALS AND SOCIAL PROGRESS 15 

social combination exists for the sake of the individual, or social 
unit. It is the individual only who struggles, suifers and enjoys. 
Societies and institutions are to be approved or condemned by 
their relative utility in conducing to the freedom, happiness, 
opportunity and completeness of life in the individual. The 
founder of Christianity recognized this truth when he declared 
that " the Sabbath is made for man, not man for the Sabbath." 
So all institutions, scientific sociology affirms, are made for man, 
not man for institutions. 

Notwithstanding this obvious and important difference, 
essentially psychological in its character, the resemblances 
between social and organic structures are sufficiently evident 
and noteworthy to render the knowledge of biological laws most 
instructive, if not absolutely essential, to the political economist 
and sociologist. Both biology and sociology treat of the 
phenomena of life ; both involve psychological as well as merely 
physical conditions. In the natural order of the sciences, the 
one leads up to the other by an inevitable sequence. Whether 
we agree that a society may properly be termed an organism or 
not, there is a similarity in the processes of growth between 
biological and sociological structures which is noteworthy and 
most suggestive. Inorganic structures grow by simple accretion, 
or addition to their bulk. Their growth is involuntary, and is 
chiefly determined by external forces and conditions. Organic 
substances, on the contrary, grow by intussusception, a process of 
waste and repair which directly affects the individual cell or 
structural unit throughout the internal constitution of the organ- 
ism. In this respect the growth of societies resembles that of 
organic structures : it is a sort of vital chemistry. The individual 
in his relation to society resembles the cell in the biological 
organism. The death of individuals and the birth and growth of 
others to fill their places in society proceed in like manner with 
the process of waste and repair in organic structures. " Human 
institutions," says Taine, "like living bodies, are made and 
unmade by their own forces ; and their health passes away, or 
their cure is effected, by the sole effect of their nature and 
situation." We are beginning to see that where the growth of 
political societies is forced by mere accretion, as by the external 
compulsion of conquest or an unassimilated immigration of alien 
elements, the addition is a source of weakness instead of strength, 
a disintegrating instead of an integrating factor. 



16 OUR nation's peril 

In the biological structure, the attractive forces which bind 
atoms into cells, and cells into an organic unity, are molecular and 
physical. In the sociological structure, they are functional and 
psychical. Herein, I think, lies the explanation of that difference 
between these structures which Mr. Spencer and other writers 
have recognized. As to the essential nature of those forces which 
we call attractive, — e. g., gravitation, cohesion, and chemical 
affinity, we really know nothing. We know these forces only 
through their observed effects; and their "laws," which we 
deduce from repeated observations of these effects, are merely 
our subjective classifications of observed recurrent phenomena. 
In regard to sociological phenomena, however, we have an 
additional means of information. We can study the attractive 
forces which bind societies together, not only in the secondary 
relation of their observed effects, but also in their primary 
relation as movements of our own thought. Affection and self- 
interest are thus seen to be the attractive forces which bind 
society together ; and these forces are directed and made steadily 
operative -solely by individual volition. Therefore it is that on 
its psychical side — the side directly involved of necessity in all 
processes of attempted social amelioration or change — society is 
subordinated to the individual, the structure to the unit or monad, 
instead of the reverse, as in the evolution of biological organisms. 
Recognizing this important psychological law, the conclusion 
is logical and inevitable that all actual and permanent expansion 
and integration of societies must ' proceed by the voluntary 
co-operative action of individuals. The statesman or social 
reformer who would Avork in harmony with the tendencies and 
laws of Nature, must therefore direct his efforts toward convincing 
the judgments and converting the motives and moral natures of 
individuals, rather than toward forcibly changing the customs 
and institutions of society by legal enactment, military domination, 
or a majority vote under the white heat of an emotional political 
campaign. These customary methods of attempting to effect 
social changes may be of some service as educational influences, 
inciting thought in the unreflecting, but as means of finally 
solving and disposing of social or political problems, they are 
lamentable failures.^ It is the too exclusive dwelling on biological 

1 The condition of the Negro, and of the social problem generally, in our Southern 
States, a generation after the edict of emancipation, furnishes significant testimony 
to the truth of this principle. It is significant, also, that in profiting by the results 
of the " shot-gun " policy in Hawaii we no longer oppose it in the Carolinas. 



SOCIAL IDEALS AND SOCIAL PROGRESS 17 

analogies by students of society which leads to socialistic and 
communistic conclusions to be enforced by the militant power of 
the State. Here psychology should come in as a corrective, 
showing that man, through his voluntary action, is constantly 
reacting on his environment and re-creating it in the image of 
his own ideals. 

The family was the earliest of all social combinations, and 
constitutes the true type of every phase of societary development. 
The family is based on the marriage relation, and all true 
marriage rests on the uncoerced consent of the contracting 
pai'ties. As this consent is more perfect and complete, recognizing 
not only physical and emotional, but also intellectual, moral and 
spiritual attractions, so is the union more permanent and 
satisfying. Conversely, in the degree to which this union is 
merely conventional and formal, effected by external compulsion, 
whether of physical force, constrained ignorance, or the artificial 
bias of law, custom or ecclesiastical policy, in the same degree 
the relation becomes false and adulterous. 

The same principle holds good in every stage of social 
combination, however complex and widely extended it may 
be. It is a sound political philosophy, justified by scientific 
sociological principles, which is enunciated in the affirmation of 
the Declaration of Independence, that "all just government rests 
on the consent of the governed." This is as true in Cuba, Hawaii 
and the Philippines as it is in Massachusetts ; it is as true of 
the older monarchical and aristocratic systems as it is of a 
democratic-republican form of government. While the evolu- 
tionary sociologist recognizes that dilferent forms of government 
are adapted to varying degrees of culture and social development, 
he also knows that an autocracy which does not rest upon the 
actual consent of the governed, which finds no response in the 
hearts of the people, but is maintained solely by military 
compulsion, is a tyranny, unstable in its foundations, unadapted 
to its social environment, and destined to early destruction by 
peaceful or violent means. ^ 

While recognizing the relativity of ethical principles and 
institutional forms, and the consequent adaptation of different 

1 The recent attempts to discredit the ^Imcrican principle in academic circles in 
the interest of colonial expansion {vide recent articles and published addresses by- 
Professors John Bach McMaster, H. H. Powers, F. Spencer Baldwin, and others) 
indicate a lamentable failure to grasp the scientific principles underlying the whole 
problem of government and civil rights. See Appendix, II. 



18 OUK NATION S PERIL 

forms of government to varying stages of individual intelligence 
and social progress, tlie ideal form of society and ethics, as the 
ultimate type of social and individual evolution, should always 
be kept in view by the sociologist, legislator, and social reformer, 
else they will be lost in a maze of empirical experimentation, as 
fatal to wise practical leadership as would be the adoption of the 
panaceas of closet-philosophers and a priori theorists. These 
ideals are discovered through experience and historical investiga- 
tion, in strict accordance with the scientific method ; but they can 
only be permanently approximated as we lift the masses of the 
people by training and culture — physical, intellectual, moral and 
spiritual — to higher levels of life and thought. 

The object of the social reformer should be to accomplish the 
renovation of society, and to secure this end with the least 
possible friction and delay. Both these results are attained by 
the method of evolution; both are retarded and thwarted by 
anarchical violence and the compulsion of militant methods. 
The rational individualism of the evolutionary ideal must be 
sharply distinguished from the destructive anarchism that aims 
at sudden and violent revolution. Here, too. Biology offers us 
a wise suggestion. Galton's law of " reversion toward mediocrity " 
shows that biological changes which are suddenly effected by 
artificial selection and forcible deviation from the main trend of 
natural evolutionary tendency are not permanent. They last 
only as long as the organisms are kept constantly under the stress 
of the artificial conditions that have produced them. When left 
to the unrestrained operation of purely natural forces, they 
speedily revert to their original status. This is also the case in 
social evolution whenever the conditions are artificially forced 
in advance of the intellectual culture and functional development 
of the masses of the people. As new social ideals can only very 
slowly supplant those which are ingrained by ages of custom and 
prejudice, the aim of the social reformer should be to stimulate 
thought by example and object-lesson rather than to compel the 
sudden alteration of habits, and thus to build along the great 
lines of natural evolutionary tendency, making use of those 
elemental social, moral and biological forces which are the most 
effective helpers toward the desired end. 

If, now, I have been fortunate in the presentation of my 
subject, certain points should be made clear by the previous 
discussion : 



SOCIAL IDEALS AXD SOCIAL l'IlO»iKKSS 19 

1. That man is the only animal capahle of creating ideals. 

2. That these ideals become the most important factors in 
social evolution and the building of individual character. 

3. That, since they spring from the synthetic imagination of 
finite man, they will lead him aright or astray as they conform 
more or less perfectly to the laws of social evolution. 

4. That by the application of the scientific method to 
sociological investigations, these laws are discoverable, and 
ideals in harmony with them may be created for our guidance. 

5. That permanent social changes can only be effected by 
convincing the judgments and enlightening the consciences of 
individual men and women. The permanent integration of 
societies can only be assm-ed by the uncoerced consent of the 
governed. 

If the principles herein laid down are sound, reasonable, and 
based on legitimate scientilic data, certain helpful inferences 
relating to important problems now before us for solution may 
be logically deduced from them. As has already been intimated, 
vokuitary co-operation, instead of an enforced communistic 
regidation and regimentation of society by legislative enactment, 
constitutes the social and industrial ideal prophetically outlined 
by the study of the principles underlying the entire process of 
ethical and social evolution. The success of efforts toward the 
attainment of this ideal will depend on both the intelligence and 
the moral attainment of the individual citizens in a given 
community. The liberation of the individual — his increasing 
freedom to secure the satisfactions consequent upon the normal 
and harmonious exercise of all his faculties — will proceed ^jori 
passu with an increasing interdependence between individuals, 
and between each and the social organism. The processes of 
social differentiation and integration go on hand in hand. As 
occupations become more diversified, the individual acquires 
greater skill in his special vocation; he produces a greater 
amount of wealth, and thus contributes more to the well-being 
of society, as well as, under a properly regulated labor-system, to 
his own well-being. Fewer hours are required for labor as the 
processes become differentiated and relatively automatic. More 
time may be given to individual culture, social intercourse, and 
the service of the Commonwealth — to the development, in short, 
of that fulness of life which constitutes the ideal of a perfect 
manhood. 



20 OUR nation's peril 

In wisely serving himself, the laborer is thus at the same time 
rendering a greater service to society. This, by a natural 
reaction, inures again to his own moral and spiritual development. 
Egoism is thus purged of its excesses, and made to promote the 
general well-being. In the proper equilibration of egoistic and 
altruistic motives, all conflict between these motives ceases. In 
wisely serving his neighbor, man renders the truest service to 
himself, and vice versa. Thus society integrates by a natural 
process of growth, forming a real Brotherhood of Consent, 
instead of a militant organization, consolidated by external 
coercion. The condition of society prefigured in this ideal is 
one in which each individual shall have full opportunity for the 
development of his whole nature, a direct interest in the products 
of his labor commensurate with the amount of intelligence, 
faithfulness and skill which he puts into his work, and to which 
each shall therefore freely contribute his noblest and most 
conscientious service.^ 

In its political and governmental aspects, this ideal indicates 
that the true scientific method of national growth is by the 
voluntary federation of Commonwealths, to each of which is 
guaranteed local autonomy and self government, based on the 
consent of the governed. This is the true American method 
outlined in the Declaration of Independence. This noble ideal 
of our Fathers is utterly opposed to the Old World policy of 
armed conquest and the maintenance of vast Colonial possessions 
under military domination. The government of an alien popula- 
tion by rulers in whose choice they have no part, and under laws 
in the making of which they have no representation, is the very 
essense of imperialism — the very antithesis of democratic- 
republicanism. Eeversion to that method in America or its 
outlying possessions would be a distinct social retrogression, 
indicating a degeneration in our social and political methods, 
judged by this scientific and evolutionary test. It would 
substitute a new militant ideal in place of that conception of the 
just sphere and basis of government which has been our best 
heritage from the Fathers, and it would be only a question of 
time for this ideal to effect an entire transformation of our 
political and industrial life into the image of the Old World insti- 

1 This particular phase of the subject has been previously treated by the writer in 
an article on " The Relation of Biology to Sociology," Popular Science Monthly, June, 
1892. 



SOCIAL IDEALS AND SOCIAL PROGRESS 21 

tutions which the Fathers deliberately contemned and rejected. 
Social science based upon the doctrine of evolution says that the 
Kingdom of God cannot come by violence. Revolutions, wars, 
standing armies, navies which are a menace to other nations, are 
no part of the machinery of the ideal social state : they are 
reversionary survivals of the method of brute conflict which 
prevails on the lower animal plane, and are justified in the 
imperfect civilization of the present day only to the extent to 
which they are absolutely necessary for defensive and police 
purposes. Beyond this limit they are at once unscientific, 
immoral and uneconomical. 

Instead of creating new antagonisms in the world of thought, 
the social ideal thus outlined and prefigured by the scientific 
method mediates between apparently antithetical and opposing 
systems, and recognizes that which has permanent value in each. 
Thus, while it opposes the method of Socialism in all its coercive 
and communistic features — its tendencies to political centraliza- 
tion and government interference with the liberty of the 
individual; while its own appeal is directly to the conscience 
and intelligence of the individual, — it nevertheless recognizes 
the fact that the rational end of all societary evolution is more 
perfect social integration. As we approach nearer and nearer to 
an ideal social state, the individual will depend for the satisfaction 
of his wants more and more upon the combined activities of 
other individuals. To these combined activities, however, the 
contribution of each will ultimately be wholly voluntary, impelled 
by a conviction that his own interest is identical with that of the 
community in general. With this ideal kept steadily in view, 
laws should be so adjusted that those only shall feel them as a 
burden, restraint, or compulsory incentive to action, whose aims 
are dominantly selfish and whose actions would violate the equal 
rights and privileges of their neighbors. Thus the inner 
constraint of ethical motive will gradually supplant external 
compulsion in the government of society. 

That the principle of competition which has thus far been the 
mainspring of social and industrial progress will ever be wholly 
eliminated is not probable, nor does it seem desirable. Rationally 
regulated and devoted to just ends, it will survive as emulation 
to render the most skilful and efficient service in return for a just 
and adequate compensation. The egoistic faculties lie at the 
very foundation of the vital energies of society as well as of the 



22 OUR nation's peril 

individual, — of existence itself, indeed, — and their rational 
exercise and conservation are therefore essential to the welfare 
of mankind. The tendency of human progress, however, will be 
toward a condition of progressive social integration, wherein a 
due balance will be maintained between altruistic and egoistic 
activities, and wherein both, wisely directed, will ultimate in 
common social ends. 

While the higher synthesis of a social science based on the 
evolution-philosophy thus harmonizes the essential truths of 
individualism and socialism under the form of a Brotherhood of 
Consent, it points also to the significant fact that this harmony 
can only be completely realized by the submission of the 
individual to the mandates of the inexorable moral law. The 
individual liberty involved in the conception of a Brotherhood 
of Consent is no unrestrained libertinism of personal action ; it is 
freedom to obey law — a freedom only to do that which is right 
and just and equitable. And the ethical obligations which are 
thus imposed upon individuals are, by this conception, also made 
obligatory upon the collective action of individuals which 
constitutes the State. The ideals of a people are to a large 
degree objectified in legislation and governmental administration. 
The men to whom we commit this sacred trust should therefore 
be of the highest character and firmly centered in the noblest 
principles and ideals of popular government — men who will 
listen to the voice of principle and conscience rather than to 
popular clamor and the demands of a short-sighted commercial 
greed; whose intent purpose will be to stand erect, catch the 
accents of divine justice from above, and preserve the people's 
inheritance, if need be, even against the blind assaults of a 
misguided majority, rather than crouch with ears to the ground, 
ready to barter the birthright of freedom for a mess of Old World 
imperialistic pottage, if the siu-ging mob-spirit, backed by an 
unholy greed of gain, shall seem to give assent to the mistaken 
policy. 

The laws of conduct, in the collective activities of the State 
no less than in the life of the individual, are no mere conventions 
of time and place ; they are '•' necessary consequences of the 
constitution of things." They are seen to have been operative 
throughout all stages of moral and social evolution, even the 
lowest. Conditions precedent to all progress, they have, by the 
enforcement of their penalties even upon the ignorant violators 



SOCIAL IDEALS AND SOCIAL PROGRESS 23 

of their behests, compelled man to recognize their imperative 
nature, created in him a conscience sensitive to the requirements 
of duty, and thus served as school-masters to inform him of his 
obligations as man and citizen. Since the laws of conduct are 
seen to be as natm-al and imperative as the laws of gravity, 
cohesion and chemical affinity ; since, like these laws of the 
physical universe, they are not to be regarded as arbitrarily 
imposed conditions on human action, but rather as the modes 
whereby an Energy immanent in all phenomena is manifested in 
the ordering of condiict, the government of the Ideal State will 
manifestly be at once theocratic and democratic, as it is also at 
once socialistic and individualistic. 

In a Brotherhood of Consent, cemented by the wisely allied 
attractive forces of affection and self-interest, the individual 
members will thus be conscious seekers for unity Avith the 
Infinite Source of all order, beauty, law and beneficence — the 
sole Eternal Reality amid the shifting scenes of this world of 
transitory phenomena. Not by compulsion, but by a divine 
impulsion, must men and women be di-awn to this obedience. 
They must be inspired by the loftiest ideals, led not by stress of 
duty regarded as *' necessitation to an end unwillingly adopted," 
but by the joy of willing service, before the ideal social 
conditions will begin to be realized upon the earth. 

Afar off yet, say you, is this Kingdom of Heaven — this City 
of the Light? The rising sun of the year 2000 will hardly be 
reflected from its golden spires into the wondering eyes and 
grateful hearts of a glad and free humanity. Unless we prove 
faithful to the sacred trust received from the Fathers, ours in 
America it will not be to lead the world into this region of 
millennial hopes. When M. Guizot asked James RusseU Lowell, 
'' How long will the American Republic endure ? " he received 
the wise and significant reply, "So long as the ideas of its 
founders continue to be dominant." So long, indeed, and not 
one moment longer. Let us not blind our eyes to the solemn 
truth. But though we prove recreant, ideals founded in righteous- 
ness and love will not perish. The flag of international peace, 
spurned by the American Senate, is caught up already by the 
Czar of all the Russias, and his word, whatever his motive, 
noblest yet spoken by a ruler of men, shall live immortal in the 
pages of history, and glow as a noble ideal among the stars of 
prophecy until the nations own the power and seek the beneficent 



24 OUR nation's peril 

effulgence of its light. And so, if we scorn the birthright of the 
Fathers, another people will be fomid who will clasp it to their 
hearts and lead the world to victory under its banner. Listen to 
the voice of England's great prophet: "Hast thou considered 
how Thought is stronger than Artillery-parks, and (were it fifty 
years after death and martyrdom, or two thousand years) writes 
and unwrites Acts of Parliament, removes mountains, models the 
world like soft clay ? Also, how the beginning of all Thought 
worthy the name is Love ? " ^ 

We have the truth yet to learn — from science and history, if 
we will; from hard experience, if we must — that Ideals are 
more powerful than Idols, though they be cased in triple-plated 
steel and speak destruction from a thousand brazen throats. We 
have yet to learn, though it shames a true American heart to 
confess it, that by peaceful federation alone, with local autonomy 
and self-government, can the brotherhood of nations be achieved 
and the girdle of civilization be clasped around the earth. Afar 
off yet, indeed, is this Kingdom of Heaven ; but, be it far away 
or near at hand, it is an ideal worth hoping for, praying for, 
striving for with all our mind and soul and strength, that this 
generation may take some firm and irrevocable steps thitherward. 
So doing, it will live forever blessed in the hearts and memories 
of its children and its children's children. 

1 Carlyle : " The French Revolution." 



SOCIAL IDEALS AX1> SOCIAL I'KOOKKSS 2u 



APPENDIX. 



AX AMERICAN POLICY. 



The advocates of territorial expansion and the imperialistic 
propaganda assert that its opponents have no definite policy for 
the disposal of the islands relinquished by Spain, and ask, in 
view of the actual results of the war, what we propose to do 
about it? 

The question is a fair one, though, generally speaking, the 
onus of explanation and the definition of policies rests with those 
who propose a revolutionary change in the traditional principles 
which have governed us heretofore, rather than upon those who 
stand by the old American doctrines. What the opponents of 
imperialism favor should be readily inferred from the statement 
of what they think ought not to be done. Recognizing the 
actual changes that have been effected by the war, the obvious 
obligations of our government, consistent with the American 
principle that " all just government rests on the consent of the 
governed," would seem to be : 

1. To carry out the solemn pledge made to the world with 
respect to Cuba, and retain military possession only long enough 
to enable the Cubans to organize a government of their own. 
This does not imply the continuance of military occupation for 
several years, or an indefinite period. A few months, at most, 
should witness the withdrawal of every United States soldier, 
and the complete relinquishment of Cuba into the hands of its 
own citizens. After that, it should remain absolutely free and 
independent. We have no right to insist that our OAvn, or any 
particular form of government, shall be adopted by the Cubans, 
or to impose qualifications for citizenship upon them. The 
people of Cuba should be left to work out their own political 
salvation, as we have done, and as Mexico, Haiti, and the Central 
and South American Republics are doing. For this course we 



26 OUR nation's peril 

have ample precedent in our attitude toward Mexico, Haiti, 
Peru and Venezuela. 

2. The people of Porto Eico should also be allowed freely to 
elect whether they will become a part of the United States, or 
maintain an independent government. If, as now seems probable, 
they should prefer to unite their fortunes with ours, they should 
be guaranteed at once the full right of local self-government, 
free from military dictation, and territorial representation in the 
Congress of the United States. No inhabited territory should 
be acquired by this government which cannot be so treated, and 
ultimately be received into our family of States. 

3. Our relations to Cuba and Porto Eico — unless the latter 
should be received as a self-governing territory — should hence- 
forth be such as befit neighboring friendly nations, and as are 
implied in the maintenance of the Monroe doctrine. If, at some 
future day, they should with reasonable unanimity freely elect 
to become a part of the United States, and we should deem them 
worthy of complete assimilation into our body politic, such a 
consummation would not be in contradiction with our professed 
principles of government. 

4. Our policy in the Philippines should be identical with that 
to which we are pledged in Cuba. At the earliest possible 
moment, within a few months at most, we should withdraw our 
army and leave the islands in possession of their own people, 
who should be permitted to establish a government, or govern- 
ments, adapted to their social, religious and industrial needs. 
They should be free to work out their own political salvation, 
with such treaty guarantees of protection as may be necessary to 
preserve them from the rapacity of the European powers. In 
these guarantees, we might not improperly ask the co-operation 
of some of the Eiu'opean nations. 

Under no circumstances should the Philippines, or any distant 
territory inhabited by an alien and semi-civilized population, be 
retained as a permanent colonial possession of the United 
States. 

5. The treaty of Paris should be amended so as to relieve 
us from the responsibility of assuming even temporary sovereignty 
in the Philippines. If it should be ratified without amendment, 
we may rightfully ask of the I'hilippines the repayment of the 
money paid to Spain. Such limited possessions as we may 
require, there or elsewhere, for coaling stations may be secured 



SOCIAL IDEALS AND SOCIAL rUOOKKSS Ji 

by treaty stipulations, and should not involve the assumption of 
sovereignty over the native po})ulation. The present situation 
also offers opportunity for such mutually advantageous com- 
mercial relations in the Philippines and elsewhere as may be 
secured by treaty, with due regard for the rights of other 
nations. All the assumed advantages to be derived from 
annexation could thus be assured without a tithe of the expense 
involved in the maintenance of permanent colonial dependencies, 
and without violating or discarding the principle that "all just 
government rests on the consent of the governed." 

6. Spain having relinquished all these possessions as a result 
of the war, none of them should be returned to her, or traded to 
other European powers, without the free consent of their native 
inhabitants. 

Since writing the above, I have received from Hon. Charles 
Francis Adams a copy of his noble defence of the policy of the 
Fathers, in his recent address on " Imperialism and the Tracks 
of the Forefathers," before the Lexington Historical Society.^ 
In a supplementary letter to Hon. Carl Schurz, printed with this 
address, Mr. Adams outlines an American policy of '^ Hands Off ! " 
for Cuba, Porto Eico and the Philippines, quite consistent with 
the plan which I have above indicated. The gratitude of all true 
Americans is due to the great-grandson of John Adams for so 
clearly presenting the historical aspects of this problem. 

1 Published by Dana Estes & Co., Boston. 



28 OUR nation's peril 



11. 

DANGER SIGNALS. 

A FEW quotations from the recent utterances of prominent 
advocates of territorial expansion and the imperialistic policy- 
will emphasize and illustrate the revolutionary attitude of the 
new movement, and the great peril in which our American 
experiment of a " government of the people, by the people, for 
the people " is placed by its advocacy. These utterances need 
no commentary. 

" We have the English feeling with us. As I discovered in 
returning from the tropics they were very grateful that we were 
going to extend our Colonial system, and they assured us that 
we could not let go of anything that we had. A great many 
people have insisted that the Constitution forbids it. To these 
I have said, 'We have outgrown the Constitution. It is not 
worth while to discuss it. We are here, and we are here to 
stay.' " — Gen. Wesley Mereitt, at dinner of the New England 
Society, New York, Dec. 21, 1898. 

"When questioned regarding the Cubans in the matter of 
American occupation and their aspirations regarding the estab- 
lishment of a government of their own. Admiral Sampson said : 
' In the first place it does not make any difference whether the 
Cubans prove amenable to the sovereignty of this Government 
or not. We are there. We intend to rule, and that is all there 
is of it.' " — Interview in New York Times, Dec. 24, 1898. 

Major-General Sh after, speaking at a meeting of the Young 
Men's Club, in the New York Avenue Presbyterian Church, 
Washington, D. C, Jan. 11, 1899, said he thought a military 
government was the only form of government the people of the 
Philippines would respect. ... He was satisfied there would be 
a fight, and the sooner it would come, he thought, the better it 
would be for the situation generally. " My plan would be," he 
said, " to disarm the natives in the Philippine Islands, even if 



SOCIAL IDEALS AND SOCIAL PROGRESS 29 

we kill half of them in doing it. Then I would treat the rest of 
them with perfect justice." — Boston Herald dispatch, Jan. 12, 
1899. 

[" The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be 
infringed." — Constitution of the United States.'] 

" I cannot see how we can help becoming ultimate owners of 
Cuba. Our resolution to the contrary was a piece of sickly 
sentimentality. We went to war on account of the * Maine,' 
and not for humanity's sake." — Congressman Hull, Chairman 
of House Committee on Military Affairs, Aug. 13, 1898. 

" The Anglo-Saxon advances into the new regions with a Bible 
in one hand and a shot-gun in the other. The inhabitants of 
these regions that he cannot convert with the aid of the Bible 
and bring into his markets he gets rid of with the shot-gun. It 
is but another demonstration of the survival of the fittest." — 
Congressman Sulloway, Nov. 22, 1898. 

"Our declaration relative to Cuba makes no difference when 
put alongside of our duties." — Congressman J. G. Cannon, 
Chairman House Committee on Appropriations, Nov. 23, 1898. 

"We will hold Cuba until the people there wake up to the 
realization that their greatest security and prosperity lie in 
annexation to this country." — Senator Morgan, Oct. 29, 1898. 

" The United States must hold permanently, not only Hawaii, 
but also Cuba, Porto Rico and the Philippines." — Retired Rear- 
Admiral Belknap, at dinner of the Massachusetts Club, Boston, 
May, 1898. 

[The demand of Admiral Belknap was endorsed by Retired 
Rear- Admiral Kimberly, at the same time and place.] 

" We must govern the people of Porto Rico and the Philip- 
pines as we have governed the American Indians." — Senator 
Morgan, in published interview. 

"We must hold oiu' new possessions under military govern- 
ment." — Capt. MauaNj Author of "The Influence of Sea Power 
on History," etc. 



30 OUR NATION S PKRIL 

" No public duty is more ul-gent than to resist from the outset " 
any idea of admitting Hawaii, Porto Rico, Cuba or the Philippines 
to the Union. — From an utterly cold-blooded and un-American 
article by Peace Commissioner Whitelaw Reid, in the 
September Century. 

Any American who wishes to see clearly whither we are 
drifting should read the article just referred to, and also one by 
Professor John Bach McMaster, in the December Forum. 

In the latter article. Professor McMaster maintains, in the 
interest of imperialism, that " foreign soil acquired by Congress 
is the property of and not a part of the United States ; that the 
territories formed from it are without, and not under the Consti- 
tution ; and that in providing them with governments Congress is 
at liberty to establish just such kind as it pleases, with little or 
no regard for the principles of self-government ; . . . and that it 
is under no obligation to grant even a restricted suffrage to the 
inhabitants of any new soil we may acquire, unless they are fit 
to use it properly." Of this fitness, of course, we and not they 
are to be the judges. 

These amazing propositions of the historian of "the American 
People" {sic) have been effectually refuted by Mr. Myron E. 
Pierce, in a letter to the Boston Herald, dated Dec. 13, 1898. 
Mr. Pierce shows by references to repeated decisions of the 
Supreme Court of the United States that the powers of Congress 
and the people over the territories are limited by the provisions 
of the Constitution in defence of the personal and political 
rights of the inhabitants, as guaranteed in the States. 

Dr. H. H. Powers, professor of economics in Leland Stanford, 
Jr., University, defending territorial expansion, declares that " It 
needs no prophet to foretell the end of the man or nation whose 
susceptibilities are not the servants of his interests." 

Professor P. Spencer Baldwin, of the Boston University, who 
disclaims being an expansionist because he " cannot see that any 
substantial gain to the American nation in particular or to 
mankind in general is likely to result from the proposed policy," 
affirms that the issue raised by imperialism is to be decided by 
arguments "based flatly on the ground of material interests." 
Professor Baldwin further declares that "The most of the 
arguments used against the so-called policy of imperialism I 
regard as academic and impracticable. An appeal is made to 



SOCIAL IDEALS AND SOCIAL PROGRESS 31 

tradition and the views of Washington. But tliese only mean 
that in other times and under other conditions other views have 
been hehl. Moreover, the claims of its unconstitutionality and 
its essential disagreement with the Declaration of Independence 
do not seem to me well taken. As for the latter, it at all events 
is but a piece of eighteenth-century philosophy which is no 
longer regarded as applicable to the concrete." "The framers 
of the Declaration of Independence," he says, "were not 
plenarily inspired. Their doctrines of human rights will not 
decide present problems. . . . Expansionism cannot be conjured 
away by the mere flourish of an ancient parchment." — Letter in 
Boston Transcript. 

The Boston Herald, with all the enthusiasm of a recent 
convert to the imperialistic policy, is not only willing to throw 
the Declaration of Independence overboard; it also advocates 
discarding the other distinctively American doctrine of the 
separation of Church and State, in our government of the Philip- 
pines and Porto Rico. The inhabitants of these islands are 
accustomed to a State Church, it argues. If we discontinue the 
establishment of the Roman Catholic Church we shall find the 
government of the people much more diflicult. Ergo, continue 
the establishment. Facilis descensus Averni! 

Similar quotations from imperialistic literature could be 
indefinitely multiplied. 



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